


Teeth

by softtsett (softency)



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst and Feels, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Basically Seungcheol Just Wants To Fight But Then Jeonghan Turns His Life Into A Circus, Blood, Blood and Injury, Blood and Violence, Bruises, But it gets better I promise, Fight Club - Freeform, Fighter Choi Seungcheol | S.Coups, Fighter Yoon Jeonghan, Fighting, Fist Fights, Hook-Up, I Might Be Missing Something So More Tags Might Come Later, I'm Going To Hurt You In This One, I'm Sorry, M/M, Making Out, Minor Jeon Wonwoo/Kim Mingyu, Neck Kissing, Not Beta Read, Smut, You'll Understand When You Learn Things In This Fic, underground fighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-14
Updated: 2019-12-14
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:35:40
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21776887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softency/pseuds/softtsett
Summary: The first time he fought Angel he wanted to keep him up close, to take in how gorgeous he is, and now, the second time they’re shaking hands Seungcheol wants to be as far away from him as possible.He barely hears the announcer call for the fight to begin before Angel is lunging at him.
Relationships: Choi Seungcheol | S.Coups/Yoon Jeonghan
Comments: 21
Kudos: 154





	Teeth

**Author's Note:**

> [here you go, this song was on repeat as I wrote this so this the entire atmosphere](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JWeJHN5P-E8)  
> if you don't like blood or injury, this might not be your cup of tea, so if you read it, do it with cautious, yeah?
> 
> enjoy!

Everyone came to The Vault for different reasons, no two people had the same desires.

Seungcheol came as an escape from real life, and stayed for the money when he figured out how good he was in the ring.

Over the two years he’s been fighting in The Vault on and off, he’s quickly gained a reputation and he became one of the more respected fighters here, leaving everything behind when stepping into the ring, but as soon as he gets out and can stand, he’s asking how bad the other person is.

He made friends here, Mingyu (and eventually his boyfriend Wonwoo) came first, both of them not fighting every day and not taking everything to the extreme. Soon enough he met Jihoon, who only fights here and there, and eventually Seungcheol moved into the same apartment building as him. All three of them usually keep to themselves, and Seungcheol doesn’t really come down here unless he or his friends are fighting. 

New people come and go, some stay, but that’s pretty rare. They see that they can win money for fighting and they throw themselves into the ring with people who are experienced fighters only to get their lights punched out. No one knows exactly where the money comes from, but people come to watch the games, so everyone just shrugs it off after a few times in the ring.

Seungcheol’s world is tipped upside down when he sees the new guy the first time.

His first thought is _he doesn’t belong here, why is he here_ , but the moment he sees him step into the ring, pushing his hair out of his eyes with a small smile, Seungcheol knows. He _knows_ that the younger, less agile fighter is going to lose. 

And he does.

Seungcheol finds out his name is Angel as the announcer declares him the winner of the fight.

Angel isn’t the strongest, but he quickly proves himself to be fast and smart, finding openings and taking them in a split second. He has a background in martial arts, he has to because he fights so smoothly, moving in a way that is rather scarce to find in the circle of fighters here.

Seungcheol catches one of his fights after Mingyu’s beginning one, and he can’t stop his breath from hitching the moment he sees Angel thrown and he completely stills as he hits the mat.

But then Angel is getting back to his feet, his top lip bleeding, making a stark contrast against his platinum blond hair and pale skin. He wipes the blood, it ending up smearing across his face, and the crowd roars at the fact that Angel is still able to fight, more than able to, he proves.

The other man lands a few more punches before he’s on the mat, clutching his nose from where the blond had yanked his head down and kneed him in the face. 

As the announcer calls out the winner, Angel scans the crowd, somehow landing on _him_ and send him a toothy, bloody grin, waving a bit towards him, and then Seungcheol is practically bolting out of the room.

He tries to catch his breath against the cold night, panic shooting through him because _fuck, he thinks he’s falling for the attractive blond._

Four months after Angel came to The Vault, Seungcheol is lined up to fight him, and Mingyu and Jihoon are after him.

His ears are ringing as he steps onto the mats, his heart skipping a beat when he walks up to the other man and Angel has the _guts_ to grin brightly at him, like Seungcheol isn’t going to have to jump on him in a few seconds.

Angel is reaching out, holding out his hand for Seungcheol and when Seungcheol takes it, his brain short circuits. Angel’s hand isn’t rough and calloused like most people that Seungcheol has fought and even Seungcheol’s own, it’s _soft_ . His skin is so soft that it send Seungcheol’s head into a foggy place, making him wonder if Angel _was actually_ built for this, but then the next second Angel is taking his hand away, and someone is calling for the fight to begin.

Before Seungcheol can even get back into his head all the way his stomach is on fire, making one of Seungcheol’s hands shoot to the pain. 

And then Seungcheol is alert, hissing out a breath and making quick work of steadying himself back out. It only takes that second for Seungcheol to throw a punch and for Angel to move out of the way enough to throw another one of his own, sending Seungcheol’s head snapping to the side and his vision flashing white. He doesn’t know what’s bleeding, it could be his nose or a split lip, hell he could have even bitten his tongue, but all he does know now that he can taste it and he’s taking a step back. 

In that moment, the crowd goes quieter, knowing Seungcheol usually isn’t this slow, he’s respected for a reason, but now this man landed two punches on him and Seungcheol missed one all in the first ten seconds.

After that punch and the first drawing of blood, it’s a mess.

Seungcheol throws a punch, some land, mostly to Angel’s torso when the weasel isn’t trying to _grab him_.

He is quick, quicker than he’s seen him fight before. One moment Angel is moving from a punch, grabbing his arm, and then there’s searing red pain across his jaw.

_Ah, that was his lips._

He can feel blood beginning to pool in his mouth, tasting horrible and Seungcheol doesn’t get the luxury of spitting it out before Angel is coming back at him again.

If his body wasn’t screaming right now, he’d appreciate how nice Angel actually looks up close.

This time Angel keeps close, thanks to Seungcheol’s harsh grip on his bicep. He swings at Seungcheol again, but it was stupid to do because while Angel could kick his ass while he’s dancing around the ring, up close is his territory, and Angel just gave him what he needed.

Seungcheol harshly rips that punch away and lets go of the other man quick enough to land a bruising hit to his cheek. 

He’s playing defense this fight, and if Angel is confident enough to dive in like that, Seungcheol knows an opportunity when he sees one.

Seungcheol dives in, landing another punch to the other’s ribs before his feet suddenly aren’t on the ring anymore, a second later the back of his head is hitting the ground, and the next Angel is on top of him giving him just enough time to block the punches thrown to his face with his forearms.

_At least the losing view is nice,_ he idly thought, catching glimpses of Angel above him between every attack.

Seungcheol roughly threw his weight to one side, rolling them easily since Angel wasn’t built muscle wise like he was, but as soon as he straddled his waist and reeled back he was stopped abruptly by a hand firmly wrapping around his throat.

A soft, smooth hand pressing on the sides of his throat, slowly cutting off blood flow and making him light headed.

_Fuck, where had Angel learned to fight dirty like this?_ _  
_ Seungcheol met Angels eyes, his hand still balled into a fist and raised, but as he caught sight of the bruise already starting to form from how hard he decked Angel on his cheek, tainting his pretty much flawless skin, the fight slowly drained out of Seungcheol.

He sat up, in turn bringing Angel with him since he still had a firm grip on his neck, and slowly raised his hands, a clear signal now that he was surrendering. 

Seungcheol knew he could break Angel’s nose, grab and twist his wrist and sprain it, or even strike his elbow hard enough he probably could throw the joint out of place and that would probably give him a window to get the hand off, but he didn’t want to, the prize money wasn’t worth that.

All the sudden the sounds around him came rushing back to him, the surprised quiet of the crowd, and then the uproar, both positive and negative, that Angel had won.

“S.Coups surrenders, Angel wins the fight!” The announcer calls out, and all that Seungcheol can focus on is how genuinely beautiful Angel is.

It’s alarming how someone like him is in a place like this, fighting other people. He looks like a _literal angel_ with his blond hair haloed around his head, still lying on the mat. Other than the one time Seungcheol had gotten him in the face, there wasn’t any sign of damage to anything else. Seungcheol was thankful he’d aimed for the stomach and ribs tonight.

What finally snaps him out of it is Angel’s hand slipping away, trailing across the top of his chest before dropping to the ground just like the other one. Once Seungcheol is free though, his brain is rebooting and screaming at him to get the fuck out of there. 

Seungcheol stands up quickly, passing through the ropes of the ring as fast as he could without getting tripped up and ignoring everyone on his way to the makeshift locker room. 

He’s just starting to take in what just happened when the door bursts open and Jihoon is coming inside.

He didn’t even know Jihoon was here tonight.

“What the hell was that, Coups?” Jihoon hissed out, walking over to him with a worried expression decorating his features. 

It wasn’t like him to surrender at all, Seungcheol knew that, but he doesn’t know how to exactly

put what he was feeling into coherent words. You could tell him it was all a dream right now and he’d probably believe you.

_Fuck, he must have hit his head hard._

“I don’t know, I hit my head and I just want to head home.” _Part of the truth is better than none,_ he thinks, yanking off his now ruined with blood shirt and tossing it to the side before yanking on an old hoodie that already has seen sweat, spit and blood before. “I can’t think right now, Woozi, I’ll talk to you about it when I feel better, yeah?” He murmured, hearing Jihoon sigh and mumble an agreement before leaving the room for him to have quiet time so he wouldn’t get any headache.

The door to the room opened and closed, and finally alone Seungcheol let out a shaky breath. He likes Angel, he likes him way too much, and he’s never even _spoke_ to the guy before for Christ's sake. This all was one big mess, and if he doesn’t get rid of everything by the night fight with this man, he’s going to end up getting his ass kicked over and over and over again. 

His steps echo as he moves through the big room, lockers on the far side that Seungcheol has never used in his time here. On the far side of the rooms he gets to the sinks and bathrooms, heading to wet a paper towel to try and get the blood off of him before it dries and cakes up. Seungcheol winces as he spots himself for the first time, thinking to himself that Angel must really like bone on bone, because that’s what he was going for mainly in between kicking him and moving around. 

He looks like a hot mess, but he always does for the most part after matches.

He brings the towel up to his nose, finding it was not broken, but only bleeding from that first strike. _A small victory,_ he thinks to himself as he works on getting all the blood off of that part first. It took him a minute and a few paper towels to get the blood off of his face and where it had dripped down his neck combined with the blood from his split lip. 

Seungcheol opened his mouth to check his teeth and grimaced to himself. 

_Bloody teeth really isn’t a good look._

Turning on the faucet, he bent down and got some water in his hands, bringing it to his mouth to swish it around and hopefully get the shit out of his mouth well enough that if he runs into the older couple who live in the apartment beside him he won’t scare them if he smiles.

While he’s doing that he got another paper towel and wet it, moving to clean the cut on his lip the best he could for now until he could get home and properly clean it. He faintly registers someone opening the room’s door and walking in, but Seungcheol ignored it, crumbling up that towel and throwing it away before leaning down again to spit out the blood. 

He heard footsteps coming towards him, figuring it was just Jihoon coming to tell him something before Seungcheol left.

Straightening up after swishing around another mouthful of water just to be sure, he had the question of what Jihoon needed on the tip of his tongue as he looked in the mirror to see behind him.

_That wasn’t Jihoon, it was Angel._

Confusion overtook him, his eyebrows drawing together. He doesn’t know why Angel is heading straight for him with a smile on his lips.

“You’re just like everyone said you were and more, you know.” Angel commented, coming up beside him and leaning his back against the sink counter. 

“Am I?” Seungcheol said with a bit of disinterest, not really in the mood to talk with a split lip tonight. Any other time, sure, but right now he isn’t excited to sit down and have a chat with the guy that just pretty much kicked his ass.

Angel hummed in confirmation and Seungcheol could feel the weight of his stare. “I can see why you’re really well known, you’re good.” He said, his voice light and airy, a sound that you don’t hear around here too often. 

“Yeah, well I’ve been here for a couple years, so you either get good or get your lights punched out.” Seungcheol says idly, finishing up at the sink and checking his teeth before turning and heading back to his bag. Footsteps other than his own traveled with him, and Seungcheol refused to let it get under his skin. “Is there something you want?” Seungcheol asks, zipping up his bag and throwing it over his shoulder. When he turns back to look at Angel, he is now leaning against the wall nearby, watching Seungcheol move around with cat like eyes.

“If I asked, would you let me kiss you?” Angel asked without hesitation, nothing remotely _close_ to a warning given before that was thrown at Seungcheol like they were talking about the weather.

Even though his heart races a bit at the idea, the small crush he’s developed on the other man rearing its head again, he doesn’t show anything that Angel is probably wanting to get out of him.

He snorts in amusement, a small grin tugging on his lips as he shakes his head.

“Try again next time, I don’t kiss when I have split lips.” He replies easily, making his way past where the other man is standing before getting out the door to the makeshift locker room and heading towards the back of the building, wanting to get out of there as quickly as possible.

“He _what?!_ ” Mingyu almost yells, making Seungcheol quickly shush him, all three of the fighters sitting down together in Seungcheol’s apartment. 

“He asked to kiss you, is what you’re saying.” Jihoon repeats, slowly taking in everything that Seungcheol just explained that happened that night. “Well you have a bit of a crush on him, right? What’s the problem?” He asks , taking another bite of his breakfast.

Seungcheol just about chokes on his bite of food he is chewing, having to take a second to recover, ignoring the way Mingyu busts out laughing at his shock.

“What do you mean _what’s the problem_ , I just got my ass kicked by him, Jihoon.” Seungcheol complains the moment his mouth is free. “If I end up falling further for him how the hell am I going to fight him after that?” 

“So what happened to you last night? You looked like you weren’t in your own head.” Jihoon jumps in again, and Seungcheol winces a bit at the reminder of the fight last night.

“He… He has really soft hands…” Seungcheol says almost guiltily after a beat of silence, looking away from the other two men. “I got distracted by it when the fight started, and then I snapped back into reality when he punched me, but when I got him up close I got distracted again and before I knew it I was on the ground above him with his hand around my neck.” He explained quietly, distress evident in his voice. This hasn’t ever happened to him, no one has ever managed to throw him for this big of a loop just by fucking _shaking his hand_ before. 

Mingyu lets out a noise in surprise from his side of the table. Since he wasn’t there last night, this is the first that he’s hearing of the fight. “You let him fuck you up that badly, Cheol?” He asks, obviously shocked by this. 

“I like him, leave me alone.” Seungcheol practically whines, not looking back to them. He glances down to his right hand as he brought his coffee cup up to his lips, seeing the bruise blooming on his knuckles, a reminder of the punch he’d landed on Angel’s face. “He’s probably just trying to get into my head, and it’s fucking working wonders.” He murmurs against the rim of the cup, taking a few sips of the drink before lowering it again.

“You don’t have anything to lose, if he asks again take him up on it.” Jihoon says, and Seungcheol envies how calm he could remain even if he was in Seungcheol’s shoes.

“I guess.” He grumbles, stuffing another bite into his mouth and internally thanking Mingyu for changing the topic after that quickly.

  
  
  


The next time he sees Angel is two weeks later when his next match is due, and he’s fighting another friend in The Vault, someone he’s fought before a handful of times. 

He’s taking a swig of water as the announcer calls for the fighters to the ring, making the feeling of adrenaline creep into his fingertips and start to spread up his arms. 

“Good luck, kick some ass.” Jihoon says from where he’s sitting beside Seungcheol, making him laugh and grin at how plainly he said it. 

Seungcheol takes his time getting into the ring, knowing it wasn’t going to be starting until everyone got settled, and people were only starting to come back inside to watch the last fight of the night. 

Seungcheol scanned the crowd idly, not wanting to get into his head space just yet for the fight. A few familiar faces stick out, but for the most part the crowd is full of the usual higher class guys, just here to watch and bet on a fight. 

But then, he spots a familiar head of platinum blonde hair, one that sticks out of the crowd easily, and before he can stop himself he’s meeting Angel’s eyes from where the other man is leaning up against the back wall with a small smile. He waves at Seungcheol the moment he knows he’s got his attention, his grin brightening significantly. Angel mouths a ‘good luck’ to him and he forces himself to look away, not needing that distraction right now.

The announcer comes on again, calling for the fighters to meet in the center as usual, and this time Seungcheol snaps back into his mind, his entire focus back to the ring.

He gives the other man a soft smile, shaking his hand before both of them stepping back.

The moment the announcer rings the bell, Seungcheol dives in, knowing that if he doesn’t attack first, this can go downhill quickly.

The other man is technically stronger than Seungcheol, has a bulkier frame and works out enough to make Seungcheol dizzy _for_ him. He’s got more experience and is better at grappling though, so he throws one punch to his stomach before he’s tackling him down, both of them falling to the ground with a loud thud that echoed through the room. 

He couldn’t hear the crowd anymore, only his heartbeat and breathing echoing inside his head as he got a punch to the ribs, making him let out a pained sound. They flip a few times, Seungcheol doing his best to tire him out so that he’ll be easier to pin, and after a few minutes of moving around like that, Seungcheol finally does get fully on top of him straddling his lower stomach and digging his hands into the grip he has on the man’s forearms. 

After a few seconds of struggling and jerking around, trying to throw Seungcheol off of him, he lets out a breathy laugh, going still and not resisting anymore. 

Seungcheol smiled down at him, hearing the announcer call out that Seungcheol had won, fully trapping the man bellow him. He earned a smile back, even if his nose was bleeding from where one of Seungcheol’s elbows hit him.

Sitting up again, he let go of the other’s wrists, bringing one of his hands up to run through his hair. “You put up one hell of a lot more fight than you used to when you started.” Seungcheol commented, earning another laugh from him. “You okay? Nothing’s broken right?”

Still lying on the mat, he shook his head, and Seungcheol felt the weight of his playful show of roaming his eyes around Seungcheol’s body, making his ears heat up. “Nah, I’m good, the view from here is nice.” He snickered, and Seungcheol laughed loudly despite himself, knowing the other man wasn’t into Seungcheol like that, they’ve tried it out before, but they just didn’t go well together in bed. 

“Jesus, if only Woozi has heard that, you would be getting the death sentence.” Seungcheol commented, his voice light as he got off of the other man and stood up with a soft groan, his torso and arms burning. He extended a hand to him, and he took it happily, hoisting himself up and almost knocking both of them over when he stumbled a bit. “We need to catch up sometime.” He offered as they got out of the ring and headed towards the back room.

He made a sound in conformation, and Seungcheol found out when his next fight was, nearly a month from now, so they had time to go grab drinks together before then.

Seungcheol makes quick work out of changing clothes, not wanting to go out in sweaty ones that also have the man’s blood on them now. He’ll freeze his ass off if he does, he knows from experience. He faintly hears the other give him a brief goodbye, murmuring one back himself has he tugged his hoodie over his head. 

The door opens and shuts, letting Seungcheol relax fully now that he’s alone. 

Once he finally get his clothes situated on his body, he zips up his bag and hangs it off of the shoulder that isn’t on the side where his ribs got hit.

_Fuck does that hurt_.

After a moment of debating back and forth and considering to just deal with it at home Seungcheol sighs and makes his way over to the mirrors to make sure nothing is broken or bleeding that he hasn’t already checked.

As he’s pulling up his hoodie, the door opens again, and he decides to ignore it, instead focusing on how red the skin looks where he was hit and groaning when he tries to touch it. It’s swollen, but nothing that he can see gives him the idea that he’s cracked or broken a rib. At most, it’s just going to be a dark bruise there for about a week or so before it starts letting up.

“I didn’t even see him get you in the ribs.” A voice suddenly speaks up, too close for Seungcheol’s liking and making his eyes jump from his exposed ribs to the figure in the mirror.

“He kneed me the first time he flipped us.” Seungcheol says, tearing his eyes away from Angel, who looked softer than anyone he’s ever seen hanging around here tonight with a baggy sweater that might have even been a bit big on Seungcheol’s frame. He drops his hoodie and runs a hand through his hair again, already giving up on fixing the mess that the fight had made. “You need something? You’re not fighting tonight, right?” He asks, adjusting his bag where it is draped over his shoulder.

“You told me to try again, so when I heard you had a fight tonight I figured I might as well come and see.” Angel comments, and that makes Seungcheol actually turn around and look at Angel, confusion evident in his stare. 

Seungcheol takes a moment to digest what Angel is saying and how he’s looking at Seungcheol right now before he answers. “You’re not going to give up, are you?” He asks, raising an eyebrow, and when Angel just grins and shakes his head, Seungcheol finally broke and a soft laugh escaped him.

_Fuck it, what does he have to loose?_

“Come over here, I don’t have all night and my chest hurts.” He says without any trace of bite, more neutral and playful than anything.

Angel looks caught off guard by how easily Seungcheol agreed to it this time but he quickly bounced back and Seungcheol watched him take step after step closer until they were mere inches from each other.

Seungcheol drops the bag from his shoulder, leaning back against the counter before hooking one of his fingers in Angel’s belt loops and pulling him closer. He can see Angel hesitating for a brief moment, and he takes that chance to reach up and pull Angel in, meeting him halfway.

The first touch of their lips is barely there, just a light brush as they both tilted their head. The next was still tentative, but Angel does press his lips fully against Seungcheol’s and that just about stole all of Seungcheol’s breath away. 

His lips were softer than his hands, not like his own that had a few scars hidden from bad fights years ago. 

When they move in for the next kiss he feels Angel let out a breath against his lips before Seungcheol is eased into a proper kiss, this time not at all hesitant like it had been. 

He doesn’t have any reason to feel as dizzy as he does right now, he didn’t get hit even _near_ his head tonight yet in a matter of seconds with Angel this close his mind is swimming. 

They stay like that for what has to be a few minutes, both getting a feel for how each other liked to kiss and generally exploring the new feeling with carefully shared kisses.

But then Angel gets more confident as both of Seungcheol’s arms came up to drape over Angel’s shoulders, the hand that was previously resting on his neck now moving up to tangle his fingers into the blond locks.

Before he knows it, or maybe he’s just spacing out too far, Angel’s hands found his hips and in the next move Angel was asking in silent way to see if Seungcheol was okay to further the kiss. Without any hesitation Seungcheol parts his lips further, his breath hitching as he feels Angel’s tongue slip into his mouth the first time. 

After that Seungcheol spaces out fully, the only thing he can focus on is everywhere Angel is touching him and how _good_ it feels to kiss Angel. He might still be riding a bit on the adrenaline high from the fight, but right now his entire body is lighting up in a way he didn’t expect to happen just from kissing him. 

Angel’s tongue finds his and Seungcheol gets lost in the feeling. He lets the other into his mouth, letting out a soft noise when Angel closes closer, slotting his body fully against Seungcheol’s.

Angel kisses like he wants to enjoy every second of it, and outside of committed long term relationships Seungcheol has been in before, he isn’t used to this feeling. Both of them generally like the same thing, not too soft and slow but not harsh enough to bite. It’s a constant push and pull between them, neither of them only taking, but both giving equally.

“ _Fuck_.” Seungchol breathes into the kiss as Angel presses his thigh against Seungcheol’s crotch where he is already half hard from how much the kiss is affecting him. He can feel where Angel is hard against his own thigh, so he knows both of them are on the same page at least.

Seungcheol breaks off the kiss, trailing his lips along Angel’s jaw and exploring the top of his neck for a few moments before speaking once he’s got his breath back. 

“I don’t know how much I can do with my bruises.” He murmurs against his skin, licking and nipping his way along the offered space. 

Angel lets out small noises as Seungcheol moves, his grip on his hips tightening further. “I don’t mind doing most of the work if you want it.” He mumbles out, and that fully lights the fire under Seungcheol’s skin. 

“I’m not exactly fuckable right now if you want that.” Seungcheol comments and above him Angel lets out a soft chuckle. 

“I didn’t expect you to be a switch, but I am too.” He replies easily, sliding his hands under Seungcheol’s hoodie and making his breath hitch again at the cold hands against his skin. “I’ll ride you and you don’t have to strain yourself tonight, I can fuck you another time.” 

Seungcheol hums softly at that, kissing back up to his lips, actually considering it. “You’re sure you want it?” He asks, wanting to genuinely make sure the other man wasn’t just doing this on a whim, and when he pulls away there was no trace of doubt or uncertainty of any kind hidden in Angel’s features. 

“I’ve wanted you since I stepped foot in here and saw who you were, Coups.” Angel says without hesitation and that was all that Seungcheol needed to break him through and make him act on his desires. 

Seungcheol leans back in, pressing his lips to Angel’s again for a few long moments before pulling away only enough to speak again. “My apartment is only a few blocks away, if you’re really serious about this. I’m not fucking in this place.” He says with a small smile cracking across his lips. 

The smile mirrors back to him, and Seungcheol has to stop himself from kissing Angel again before he can even respond. “Well what are we waiting for then? Let’s go.” Angel says easily, so easily, like this wasn’t hard for him to just suddenly sleep with someone he’s fought and has to fight again. 

Seungcheol promptly leads them outside, walking them the short distance to his apartment building and sending a brief text to Jihoon that he’s already left and he’ll catch up with him later. 

The moment they get inside Seungcheol’s apartment, though, it’s game on once the door closes. 

Seungcheol drops his bag right there, slipping off his shoes clumsily as he can feel Angel’s hands already dipping into his waistband of his joggers. He leads them to the bedroom, getting caught up a handful of times and stopping to focus on kissing before continuing on. 

_This is a bad idea,_ his brain tells him over and over as they get closer to his bedroom. _You’re going to regret it when you can’t punch him and he_ can _still punch you_. 

But then Angel is letting out a breathy moan as Seungcheol takes his bottom lip into his mouth for a moment. 

_It’s worth it_ , he decides, shutting up his conscious even if it’s only for tonight. He can face everything in the morning, he’s just sleeping with him one time, not marrying him. _One time? You won’t stop after you get a taste._ His brain buts back in one last time before he shuts it off for the night, and all he can think of is _Angel, Angel, Angel._

Once they’re in the safety of his bedroom he starts to dip his hands into Angel’s jeans, just smoothing over his hips under his sweater. He helps him out of his clothes, pressing his lips to his neck all the while, tempted to give in and leave marks. Once Angel is down to his underwear he starts to grow impatient, his own hands freely roaming over Seungcheol under his clothes. He wiggled out of his pants and yanked off his hoodie letting Angel pull down his briefs.

He was pushed back on the bed before he knew it, enough to knock the breath out of him from his ribs. Seungcheol hissed out a breath, moving to get fully on the bed nevertheless.

“Condoms and lube are in the first drawer right there.” Seungcheol murmurs and watched as Angel easily found what they need, coming back to the bed and pressing his lips to Seungcheol’s once again. He groans softly as Angel’s tongue immediately slid back into his mouth, his hands finding the other’s waist again and dipping the tips of his fingers underneath Angel’s waistband of his underwear, playing with the fabric there for a few moments before his hands are slipping underneath fully and moved to his ass, pulling him closer. “Why are these still on?” Seungcheol complains lightly against Angel’s lips, and the other man laughs softly in response before slipping out of the fabric and tossing it to the side. 

They get lost in kissing for a minute, both of them taking their time with just mapping out each other’s body with their hands before Seungcheol finally pulls away and felt for the lube.

“You want me laying down or sitting up still?” He asks, uncapping the bottle and making easy work of slicking up three of his fingers.

“Sitting up, still want to kiss you.” Angel murmurs, kissing down Seungcheol’s jaw and to his neck. “I told you I would do all the work though.” He adds, referring to Seungcheol getting ready to stretch him by what he could guess, and Seungcheol just hummed idly in response.

He moves Angel with him until his back presses against the wall at the head of the bed, one hand gently guiding him as they adjusted again and Angel settled into his lap for the first time tonight. 

“I’m not going to let you do any more than what you already are, I can do this.” Seungcheol comments, his lubed fingers coming back to Angel’s ass and one lightly trailing down until he found his entrance. 

Angel just about jerked at that, his grip tightening dangerously on Seungcheol’s shoulders and nails digging in as the finger circled his rim before finally dipping inside and slowly inching its way in until Seungcheol is knuckle deep. 

“Relax.” He murmurs, his free hand coming up and leading Angel’s lips back to his, trying to get him distracted enough that the tension would bleed out of him, and after a few moments it works. “There you go, you gotta let me in.” Seungcheol murmurs against his lips, letting Angel take control of the kiss after that as he slipped another finger inside of the blond once he didn’t feel any more resistance. 

Angel is in the middle of licking into his mouth when Seungcheol pulls his fingers out halfway and thrusts them back in experimentally, needing so see if he is ready to continue, and from the borderline pornographic moan he gets in response, he is. Seungcheol slowly begins fucking him with his fingers, getting him used to it and scissoring them to open him up further before he slips the third inside of him, drawing out a sharp hiss from Angel that makes Seungcheol pull back from the kiss a bit to make sure he was okay. 

“Yeah, it’s- _fuck_ , it’s just been a while since I’ve been fucked.” Angel replies, pushing back onto the fingers experimentally and out of impulse, Seungcheol curls them into a spot he knew should be there, and when he finds it Angel’s back arches beautifully and another loud moan is ripped from him.

Seungcheol has to stifle a chuckle, pressing a brief kiss to his lips again. “Gotta be quieter, I have neighbors who won’t like it if they hear me fucking in the morning hours.” He reminds, earning a frustrated huff from Angel at that new instruction. 

“Then keep me quiet, Coups. I’m sure- _nnn_ … I’m sure you can figure out something.” Angel counters, rocking his hips back against the fingers inside of him and already letting out small sinful noises. 

He probably will have to, he agrees, because Angel is _loud_ with everything he’s done from the moment he kissed Seungcheol in that locker room. 

Seungcheol lets him push back and ride his hand, curling his fingers every few drops of Angel’s hips and eating up the countless noises he makes. After a few minutes Angel gets impatient, his hips rolling back more insistent and needy. 

“You ready?” Seungcheol murmurs, pressing a kiss to the corner of Angel’s mouth and when he nods quickly, he carefully slides his fingers out and feels around for the condom foil and lube. The next moments are a blur for Seungcheol, and his brain only catches up when Angel is gripping his shoulders tight again and lifting himself up. He barely has any time to process it before Angel is slowly sinking down on his cock, taking deep breaths with each inch he moves. 

Once he’s seated fully in his lap he rests Seungcheol’s head on his shoulder, taking his time to adjust to the feeling and get his breath back. 

Then Angel is moving, and Seungcheol’s head spins. 

He lifts up a bit and then rocks back down experimentally, and both of them let out choked noises. After that, it’s all fair game and Angel quickly sets a steady pace, moans and curses falling from those beautiful lips loud enough that Seungcheol brings a hand up and drags him into another kiss, deep and messy, just to keep him relatively quiet. It works for the most part, but now he can feel every breath and gasp he lets out, every moan and word he gives, and that really shouldn’t turn Seungcheol on as much as it actually does. 

His other hand is resting on Angel’s hip, smoothing over the skin there and up his side encouragingly. 

“Fuck you’re beautiful…” Seungcheol says without thinking at all, too drunk on Angel right now to even consider what comes out of his mouth. 

Angel fucking _whines_ at the praise, kissing Seungcheol harder and moving faster, making Seungcheol hiss out a ‘ _holy fuck-’._

He’s good, unfairly good at this. Every drop of his hips are making Seungcheol’s mind short-circuit, the way he’s rolling his hips and keeping both of them right on the edge of just enough and too much is _addicting_. 

Even at this point, Angel still doesn’t get rough into the brief kisses. He still takes his time and makes sure he feels everything, and Seungcheol isn’t sure if he’s ever been with someone who kissed that well in the middle of sex. 

When Angel leans down again his hips have to slow, turning into more shallow rocks and sways of his hips so that he can kiss Seungcheol again. It’s completely messy, both of them too lost on everything to even register the option to take it slow and not let spit get everywhere. Seungcheol let out a groan as Angel tugs on his hair firmly, tipping his head back and urging Seungcheol to completely bare his neck, he does so without hesitation. “God, you feel so good.” Angel says quietly as he began kissing down down Seungcheol’s neck making the fire burn brighter under his skin. He can feel Angel’s teeth against his skin, and the way he licked and sucked on his neck making his heart race. 

He can feel Angel sucking on his neck and in the back of his mind he knew he is going to have hickeys all over the side of his neck and scratches from Angel’s nails in the morning, a clear reminder for days of what he did.

After he seemed satisfied, Angel pulls back up and presses his lips to Seungcheol’s once again briefly before starting to fully ride him again. 

Seungcheol let out a loud moan when Angel’s nails dig back into his shoulders, and as Angel tightens around his cock he registers that he wasn’t going to last much longer at this rate, buy from the hurried movements and loud noises from Angel, he’s on the same page. 

“You close?” He asks breathily, watching almost in awe of how _gorgeous_ Angel looks right now. Angel quickly nods a few times, his eyes falling shut as he focuses on everything he’s doing. Seungcheol can feel Angel’s thighs trembling on the sides of his hips every time he lifts himself on Seungcheol’s cock before dropping back down. “Cum for me, Angel. Just let go.” Seungcheol urges, both of his hands smoothing across Angel’s sides before moving in between them. He wraps his hand around Angel’s cock, jerking him off in time with each rise and fall of his hips, and Angel at least muffles that scream on his own because if he hadn’t they would be getting their door knocked on to make sure everything was okay. 

Angel’s body shakes in small tremors as everything quickly becomes too much, it only taking a few more seconds before he’s leaning back down and clumsily connecting their lips, using that to mute his moans and yells rather than biting his own lip further. Seungcheol is walking the line of tipping over into his orgasm, the way Angel is moving around him is like a drug that isn’t letting Seungcheol properly think or breathe. 

Angel cums between them on both of their torsos with a cry of ‘ _Coups!’_ , and even though he’s mostly muted by Seungcheol’s tongue slipping into his mouth he’s still _loud_ . He tightens around him in a way that Seungcheol can only describe as inhuman, not giving him any chance of recovering and dragging him over the edge along with Angel. Seungcheol’s hips jerk a few times as he cums hard into the condom, a quiet mantra of _“Fuck! Angel, Angel, Angel.’_ falling from his lips like a lifeline. 

After they’ve both come down from their high Angel leans all of his weight fully against him, breathing heavily and tucking his face into Seungcheol’s neck. He’s exhausted, he has to be for lasting all that time without letting up from riding Seungcheol. He pulls out of Angel as gently as he can manage like they are, and clumsily removes and ties off the condom, throwing it in the direction of his trash can to deal with in the morning. Once that’s done he rests his hands back on Angel’s hips, carefully moving them both slowly until they’re laying down under the blanket on Seungcheol’s bed. He’s too exhausted from both the fight and the sex to call Angel someone to take him home, and Angel seems to be already falling asleep against him, so he figures Angel sleeping over one night won’t hurt. 

As soon as Seungcheol is situated in his spot Angel is instantly back on him, tucking his body flush against Seungcheol’s and laying his head against his shoulder with his face in the crook of his neck. It surprises him, but he doesn’t have it in him even if he wasn’t this tired to pull away, so he wraps his arms fully around Angel’s waist securely, earning a happy noise from the blond.

As he’s drifting off, for a few seconds he lets himself wonder what Angel’s name is and what he would sound like calling out Seungcheol’s real name instead of his cover name.

  
  


When Seungcheol wakes up in the morning the bed is cold and there’s no sign of Angel anywhere, like last night didn’t even happen. 

But as he looks in the mirror while brushing his teeth, the scratch marks and bruises on his torso and neck prove that otherwise.

  
  
  


From then on, it’s rinse and repeat.

Seungcheol will fight, and if he spots Angel in the crowd, he knows they’re going to end up falling into bed together that night. 

Every morning he’s gone without any trace except what he leaves on Seungcheol’s body.

  
  
  


Tonight wasn’t any different than the others, except that his nose almost got broken, and he had to get the blood off before they leave back for Seungcheol’s apartment.

They’ve slept together more times than he can count on one hand over the course of the last two months, and haven’t had to fight each other yet thankfully.

“I want to fuck you tonight…” Angel murmurs into his mouth as he’s trying to get his shoes off, distracting Seungcheol enough that he doesn’t register Angel’s hands sliding under his sweats until Angel is grabbing his ass and pulling their hips flush together, ripping a loud moan from Seungcheol. “You okay with that?” 

“Yeah.” Seungcheol responds weakly, not used to seeing this type of Angel that often. In all the times they’ve slept together, Angel never has brought up the fact that he was more than welcome to fuck Seungcheol, it always ending up with Angel getting fucked if they go all the way that night. 

Angel, Seungcheol quickly finds out, is completely different when he tops.

Seungcheol has two fingers inside of him along with Angel’s tongue, and he’s about to lose his mind. He’s been like this for what has to have been close to forty minutes, Angel dragging out everything he does to Seungcheol’s body and easily getting Seungcheol to squirm and his filter to his mouth to go away completely in the first ten minutes. 

And he’s only got _two fucking fingers_ inside of him, and it’s not nearly enough.

“Angel- please- I need- I need more.” He just about whines, voice already shaky. He needs more, it’s already overwhelming him, but it’s nowhere near enough to make him cum because Angel refuses to touch his prostate.

“What do you want?” Angel says after a few moments, moving his mouth away and making him have to muffle a scream in frustration. He’s calm, way too calm compared to how Seungcheol feels.

_What doesn’t Seungcheol want right now?_

His breath gets caught in his throat as Angel moves his fingers again, slowly, _so fucking slowly_ fucking him on them again. Seungcheol’s brain cuts out to static for a few seconds, having to forcefully bring himself back and look down to see Angel between his legs with a cocky, knowing smile on his lips and spit all the way down to his chin. 

_Fuck_.

“I want- _Ah!_ ” Seungcheol starts, but is quickly cut off by Angel finally curling his fingers purposefully when he starts speaking, pressing ruthlessly into his prostate for the first time. His entire body jolts and he lets out a sob of a moan, tossing his head back and his grip on the sheets under him turning his knuckles white. It takes him a few long moments to come back to himself this time, unable to steady out his breath. “I want your cock, not your fingers.” He manages to rush out before Angel can interrupt him again, and by the way the fingers inside of him twitch as he says that, he knows he’s got control over at least a small piece of Angel still. “I want to cum on your cock, not like this. Want- Want you to fill me up.” Seungcheol says without thinking at all, his filter completely gone at this point and if Seungcheol wasn’t this far gone, he’d be mortified at what he’s saying. 

“Jesus, the mouth on you when you decide to let it show.” Angel murmurs, and before Seungcheol can think of anything to say back, the fingers inside of him are moving quickly and stretching him for the third one that easily slips in moments later, making Seungcheol have to muffle what would have been a loud scream in the sudden spike of pleasure. “You’re fucking filthy, and you thought _I_ was loud.” He adds, finally fully fucking his fingers into Seungcheol and knocking the wind out of him effortlessly. 

“ _Angel._ ” He whines, blinking his eyes open and looking back to the blond and meeting his eyes. 

Angel just rose an eyebrow, curling his fingers again and making Seungcheol cry out quick enough that Seungcheol couldn’t stop it, his loud scream echoing through the room. This time, Angel doesn’t let up, still shallowly thrusting his fingers but pressing harshly into that one spot over and over and over.

“No no no!” He whines loudly, trying to move his hips away but that just results in Angel pinning them down with his free hand to where he couldn’t move at _all_ . “I don’t- I can’t- _Angel!_ ” He hiccups out around the moans being drawn from him, his hips jerking with how overwhelming it’s quickly getting and how fast he’s being pushed towards his orgasm. 

Angel doesn’t let up, and Seungcheol quickly gets too close to the edge.

“Cl-Close! Nnn-... I can’t-...” Seungcheol tries to get out coherently, his back arching a bit as Angel digs the pads of his fingers into that spot, making Seungcheol hiccup out another muffled yell. 

It only took a few more times before Seungcheol’s breath caught in his throat, instinctively clenching around the digits and his thighs shaking as his orgasm hit _hard._ Seungcheol’s vision flashes white under his closed eyes, faintly registering wetness on his stomach and chest as he blindly rode out his orgasm, Angel’s touch now softer and more caring than it had been moments ago.

Seungcheol was still panting when he managed to calm down enough to hazily blink open his eyes, meeting Angel’s stare from where he’s now sitting up fully again between Seungcheol’s legs.

“We both know you can cum more than once in a night, so you weren’t getting out of that.” Angel comments with a soft chuckle, gently easing his fingers out of Seungcheol. “You ready?” He asks, leaning forward and pressing his lips to Seungcheol’s, who melts into the soft kiss immediately. He nods a tiny bit, letting Angel lick into his mouth hungrily. Angel shifts over him, and when he heard the sound of Angel grabbing the condom foil he makes a disapproving sound, wrapping his legs around Angel’s waist. 

“I told you I wanted you to fill me up, we’re both clean.” He reminds against Angel’s mouth, and Angel lets out a groan at that, reaching for something else before he’s sitting up and uncapping the lube again. 

“ _The mouth on you is insane_.” Angel groans as he lubed up his cock, looking over Seungcheol’s body and the heat in his dark eyes already has fire licking at Seungcheol’s skin again. He tosses the lube to the side again, sliding his free hand up from Seungcheol’s knee to his hip before going to his stomach, lightly dragging a finger through the cum painted there and popping the finger into his mouth a moment later. Seungcheol’s breath hitched at that, stuttering for a moment as he forgot how to breathe at the sight. 

Seungcheol fully wrapped his legs around Angel’s waist as he moved closer, finally lining himself up and moments later slowly pushing into him, careful even with how rough he’d been minutes ago. He takes deep breaths, keeping himself relaxed until Angel is inside of him up to the hilt, making him feel incredibly full. It’s been a while since Seungcheol has been fucked, most people he sleeps with after drinks at clubs want him to fuck them, and he doesn’t mind obliging to it. After a few long moments of Seungcheol adjusting and his cock already stirring again against his stomach, he pushes his hips back, letting out a soft hiss at the feeling of Angel inside of him. 

“Move.” He breathes out, reaching up for Angel’s shoulder and pulling him down into another kiss just to distract himself from the initial weird feeling that always came with the first few movements. 

Angel obliges without any hesitation, pulling out halfway before sliding back in, drawing a choked out moan from Seungcheol and his grip on Angel’s shoulders tightened. After a few more thrusts Angel picked up the pace, properly fucking into him now and lighting Seungcheol on fire.

“ _Oh my god_ …” Seungcheol whines, his thighs shaking a bit from how sensitive he still is from his first orgasm. He was hyper-aware of everything, everywhere Angel is touching him and how completely full and covered he feels with Angel leaning over him now. 

“God, you’re such a pretty bottom.” Angel said quietly into the kiss, and that made Seungcheol keen into the kiss at the praise. “You’re so good for me, right baby?” He asks, and Seungcheol nods the best he could while chasing after Angel’s mouth again, needing _something_ to keep him grounded and not let him get caught up in his head.

Angel fucks him like a parched man finally getting water, like he needs Seungcheol so badly and that makes him feel some kind of way. He feels like he’s desired more than he’s ever really felt with people he’s just hooking up with. 

Angel surprises him and knocks him out of his daze as he feels hands suddenly on the backs of his thighs, just below his knees, and before he can even fully register it his knees are being pushed up to his chest and held there. The next thrust is sent directly to his prostate thanks to the change in angles, ripping out a yell from Seungcheol. With every thrust Seungcheol let out soft ‘ _ah!’_ s like a mantra. 

It wasn’t too long before Seungcheol is jerking and squirming a bit, letting out noise after noise with every thrust delivered and feeling himself coming dangerously close to his orgasm. 

“Cl-... Cl-...” He tries to warn Angel, their mouths just an inch away from each other, both of them too far gone to focus on kissing at this point. 

“Cum, Coups.” Angel says without hesitation, pulling away to properly look at Seungcheol and he meets Angel’s stare with his own glassy, hazy eyes. 

When he cums he arches into Angel’s body that’s caging him in, shutters flowing through his body and tugging roughly on Angel’s hair as he adds more cum between them for the second time tonight. He does end up muffling most of his sound, biting down on the hand that isn’t threaded into Angel’s hair. He hasn’t cum this hard in a while, and it completely blacked him out for a few seconds as it hit. He tightens around Angel, whimpering when Angel slowed down his thrusts and he brought Angel down into a kiss, slotting their lips together for a moment before pulling back just enough to speak.

“Keep going, you can cum in me.” Seungcheol breathes out before pulling him back into the kiss and licking into his mouth, the hand that isn’t in Angel’s hair coming up to rake his nails down his back until he got to is hip and pressed there, urging him to continue. Angel moans into his mouth once he felt the nails drag across his back, hesitating for a few more moments before he finally gave in and picks back up the pace. 

His body jerks a bit in over sensitivity, but he quickly calms down and held onto Angel, letting out small noises into the kiss. 

It didn’t take long before Angel’s thrusts grew sloppy and more shallow. Angel got louder as he got closer to the edge, and Seungcheol encouraging him the entire time.

“ _Fuck,_ _Coups_.” He moans against Seungcheol’s lips, it only taking a few more thrusts before he was falling over the edge, cumming hard inside of Seungcheol with a low groan, and Seungcheol shutters hard at the feeling. He rides out his orgasm for a few more slow thrusts before carefully pulling out of Seungcheol, making him groan in response now that he could feel Angel’s cum dripping out of him already. He was thankful when Angel reached over to the side of the bed, grabbing a few tissues and cleaned the two of them up, tossing them after he was done in the direction he’d learned by now that the trash can was.

They both settle into bed and Seungcheol pulled up the blanket to both of their shoulders, feeling Angel press a light kiss to his shoulder before draping his body half across Seungcheol’s like normal. 

They both fall asleep effortlessly that night, both too tired to even move much after everything. 

When Seungcheol wakes up in the morning he’s alone as always, but the side of the bed where Angel likes to sleep is still warm. He rolls over to it, letting himself pretend even for a moment that Angel was still here and was still going to be in his arms the next time he woke up.

The next time he wakes up it’s noon and the bed is completely cold.

He has to fight back the disappointment in his chest, because honestly, what did he expect, he never is able to catch Angel before he leaves.

  
  
  


“You’re still crushing on him, aren’t you?” Jihoon asks as they make their way to the main area for Jihoon’s fight, one that Seungcheol is always here for to support Jihoon and cheer him on since he doesn’t fight nearly as often as the other guys here.

Seungcheol licks his lips, not looking back to Jihoon as they passed by another fighter that just came out of the ring. “It’s gotten worse.” He admits, fiddling with the sleeves of his sweater. He wasn’t dressed for a fight today, in ripped skinny jeans and an over sized grey cable-knit sweater that made him look much less intimidating that he usually went for around here. 

He hasn’t told Mingyu or Jihoon about him and Angel, he can’t. He can’t do it because then Jihoon will see straight through him and tell him he’s close to falling in love with a man he doesn’t even know the _name of_ , or what he looks like in the mornings, but he does know how hard he can punch and what he looks like with his head thrown back in pleasure. 

Jihoon just hums at that and doesn’t push further, knowing if he tries to push for more answers from Seungcheol then he is going to get less and less out of him in the end. 

It was better for Seungcheol to internalize this all anyways, if he said it out loud to someone it would become real.

He takes a seat at one of the empty benches and holds Jihoon’s water bottle and phone for him, giving him a pat on the shoulder and a playful murmur of ‘break a leg’ that earns him a punch to the shoulder and sends him laughing. Jihoon enters the ring when they announce that the fight is about to begin, and Seungcheol sits down finally, watching attentively as Jihoon shakes the other man’s hand and a few seconds later the fight begins. 

He’s lost in watching the fight, not really paying attention to his surroundings since he was where most people didn’t bother sitting. 

Then, about halfway through the fight, he felt someone sit down directly beside him. Seungcheol doesn’t bother glancing over, figuring if it was important they would have gotten his attention rather than sit down next to him silently. 

“He’s good, does he usually fight around here?” A voice asks, and Seungcheol shoots his eyes over in surprise. “I’ve seen him with you and Gyu, but not many people around here know much about him.” Angel finishes, still watching the fight without looking at Seungcheol. 

He looks good, to say the least. Most nights they see each other they both were in more comfortable, breathable clothes, but now Angel has what looks like a silky shirt that wraps around the front and ties in the back, and tight jeans that Seungcheol isn't even sure he could get his hands under. 

“He used to fight more, but now he’s working and in college so he only does it for fun.” Seungcheol says off-handedly, and the moment he speaks up Angel’s attention turns to him. 

_It’s unfair how gorgeous the man is to Seungcheol and the control he has over him._

“You aren’t lined to fight tonight.” Angel comments, arching an eyebrow just the slightest bit and giving Seungcheol a small, fond smile. 

“Nope, I just came for Woozi. Someone’s gotta drag him home and clean him up at the end of the night.” He says, turning his eyes back to the man in the ring before a smile could appear on his lips too. 

They didn’t do this, small talk wasn’t something they usually even thought about, much less outside of the nights where Seungcheol is fighting. They had a routine, Seungcheol sees if he’s in the crowd, he fights, and then Angel finds him and they leave together for Seungcheol’s place, they fuck, go to sleep and Seungcheol wakes up alone. 

“Ah.” Angel murmurs in understanding, something weird about his tone, but Seungcheol doesn’t allow himself to question it or turn back to check. “He’s lucky to have you.” He adds, still a weird lilt in his voice, but Seungcheol feels him lean his weight against Seungcheol’s side slightly just to rest his head on his shoulder, not going any further and it not at all coming across as it would have if Angel had done it before they got back on their nights together. It was eerily domestic, and Seungcheol can feel panic flare up in his chest. He could do sex, even if just barely, but he couldn’t do this, he can’t be tempted like this because he can’t have Angel in the way he wants him. 

Still, Seungcheol lets Angel stay there until the fight is over and Seungcheol has to stand up. He gives Angel a soft smile before he’s heading away to meet Jihoon as he’s stepping out of the ring. 

“What was that?” Jihoon asks finally as Seungcheol has him sat in his apartment bathroom, cleaning his busted lip and making sure the hits he’d taken in the fight to his torso are just going to bruise. 

“What do you mean?” He asks, playing dumb as he continues looking over his ribs once more before handing Jihoon one of his own hoodies for the night so he didn’t have to sleep in the clothes he fought in. 

“Angel looked real comfortable with you during the fight.” He accused, and Seungcheol just hummed like this was new news to him earning narrowed eyes in return. “He was staring at you and had his head resting on your shoulder for most of the fight, everyone could see it.”

Seungcheol sighed, straightening back up and stretching his back and arms. “We’re friends, Jihoon. He doesn’t like me like that if that’s what you’re trying to hint to.” He says a bit grumpily, hoping Jihoon would drop it after that, and luckily the other man does, even though he doesn’t look convinced one bit that there isn’t something going on. 

Jihoon sleeps in his bed that night, both of them too tired to do anything else. 

It feels weird having a body in his bed other than his own and not having it draped across him. 

It feels wrong when he wakes up around noon the next day and looks over, seeing someone still in his bed. 

  
  
  


He had a bad feeling from the moment he stepped into the ring. 

He doesn’t look for Angel tonight, not wanting to look away from the other man in the ring. It doesn’t feel right, he’s getting a weird uncomfortable feeling from the man and he doesn’t want to take his eyes off of him just in case. 

As they shake hands, the man grins at him with a glint in his eyes, and for the first time in a long time, he is scared.

Then, the fight is announced to start, and he instantly reels back from a punch to his face. 

A few more seconds pass and the man practically pounces on Seungcheol, easily overpowering him in a way that he doesn’t know how to handle. 

One moment he’s conscious and trying to get out of the way of another punch, and the next he’s on the ground and his head snaps back against the floor, making his vision go spotty. It only takes one more punch before he knocks out and can’t feel anything anymore.

Everything goes dark.

Seungcheol blinks his eyes open weakly, feeling like he was moving, and even though it takes him a few long seconds, he realizes he’s in the back of a cab.

“Coups..? Coups, hey, stay with me.” A voice says from beside him, and Seungcheol’s hearing is still as blurry and muted as his vision, but he manages to faintly register that it’s Angel next to him.

He’s only conscious for a few seconds for a few more seconds before he slips back under, but before he does he feels soft hands on his face.

The next time he comes to again his arm is slung over Angel’s shoulders and he’s walking with him into an unfamiliar building. His head is killing him, sending pain from his head and down to his spine. 

He takes a few steps, trying to help out and carry most of his weight, but as soon as he tried to lift his head he’s forced back under again.

It feels like he’s underwater, and he’s trying to get to the surface. It takes him longer than he’d like, and he’s getting impatient, trying harder and this time, and he finally breaks through this time. 

He blinked open his eyes, drawing in a deep breath everything clearer than he remembers it from the night before.

After a moment he registers why his head is splitting, his nose must be broken. He feels like shit, his entire body aching. It makes sense that his body somewhat shut down last night, blocking him out so the pain wouldn’t set in yet. 

It takes him a while before he realizes where he must be; Angel’s apartment. He doesn’t know why he’s here, but he’s not covered in blood, and he’s not wearing the clothes he was wearing during the fight.  
The moment he tries to move, though, he realizes there’s something weighing him down.

That something, is Angel. 

Angel is sleeping on him.

Seungcheol’s breath hitches, a dangerous feeling bubbling up in his chest. 

This was something that he let himself pretend he was allowed to see, something that he shouldn’t be allowed to witness with what he and Angel are. 

Angel’s body was draped over his own, loosely clinging to him and his head is resting on his chest with his blonde hair haloing around him.

_He’s beautiful_ , Seungcheol immediately thought, his hands craving to run through Angel’s hair. 

This is what Angel looks like in the morning, with the sun peeking through the window and blanketing over the both of them.

The feeling in his chest built up until it was physically hurting him, and he knows he has to leave. This isn’t something he’s supposed to see, this isn’t for him. 

He gently takes Angel’s limbs off of him without waking him, lifting his head while he gets out of the bed and replacing his body with a pillow that seems to do the trick.

Finding his way out of Angel’s apartment isn’t as hard as anyone would guess for this being the first time even _seeing_ the door, but he manages and once he walks out of the building he’s bringing his phone up to call a cab back home. 

  
  


Seungcheol doesn’t see any sign of Angel for the next two weeks until he’s healed enough to step back into the ring. 

As he enters the main room with Jihoon, he keeps his eyes directed forward, not wanting to get distracted. Jihoon says a soft ‘good luck’ before they part ways and Seungcheol slips into the ring, stretching his arms a bit. Almost like it’s ingrained into him, he looks out to the crowd to the space where Angel usually stands, and to his surprise Angel _is_ here, but he’s not alone and he’s leaning on another man, laughing with him and looking at him like he’s never looked at Seungcheol.

A feeling of bitter jealousy bubbles up in his chest and throat, ripping his eyes away from their direction and waiting for the call to shake hands. 

He sends the other man a smile that he doesn’t really mean, and he can tell that it isn’t convincing in the slightest by the look on the other’s face, but it soon doesn’t matter as the announcer calls for the fight to begin, and Seungcheol fights like he used to when he first came here, full of pent up emotions and lashing out so unpredictably that the opponent can’t predict most of his punches and kicks. This catches the other by surprise, everyone here knowing Seungcheol doesn’t do this anymore, he usually wants a fair fight, not wanting to get bloody unless necessary, but tonight all he wants is to forget about what he just saw and go home immediately after this fight. 

It doesn’t take much, just a few hard punches to the man’s face and chest before he’s able to sweep his feet out from under him, not having it in him to feel bad when the man’s head hits the mat hard. Seungcheol stays standing, watching the man to see if he had to go further as he tries to catch his breath, and the other man just groans in pain, not getting up for a good ten seconds and the announcer comes back on to declare Seungcheol the winner.

Seungcheol slips out of the ring without looking back, not looking at anyone or anything as he quickly steps into the back room to get his bag, not changing out of his clothes and pocketing his phone before starting on his way out the building. He makes it back to his apartment in half the time it would usually take him if Angel is with him, throwing his bag down on the floor and walking over to the couch, plopping down and running a hand through his hair. The adrenaline is still inside him, fueled by the guilt and jealousy and bitter anger bubbling inside of him. 

His phone rings a few moments later and Seungcheol genuinely debates if he should even get it out of his pocket, knowing he was likely to lash out at the smallest thing right now. When his phone doesn’t stop ringing after a few moments Seungcheol groans unhappily, digging his phone out of his pocket and blindly answering it with a grumpy ‘hello?’.

_“Where are you?”_ Jihoon’s voice comes across the phone, impatient and worried.

“Home, sorry for not sticking around.” Seungcheol murmurs, leaning back fully against the couch and tilting his head back to rest on the back of it. 

_“I’m coming over and you’re going to explain what just happened and why you’ve been off for the past months.”_ Jihoon declares with no room for argument, and before Seungcheol could argue against it Jihoon ends the call and the line goes dead.

_Fuck._

Seungcheol’s eyes lazily went to the door when he heard a key being put in and it opening, knowing Jihoon could get inside on his own with the spare key of Seungcheol’s he has. 

“What the hell was that? You don’t fight like that anymore for a reason, what tripped you up enough in the short fucking time I left you and the fight started?” Jihoon immediately set in, toeing off his shoes at the doorway before walking inside and sitting down at the opposite end of the couch, watching Seungcheol like a hawk.

“I saw Angel.” He says simply, not wanting to admit out loud that he’d got jealous of something so small.

Jihoon pauses for a moment, eyes roaming over Seungcheol’s features before speaking again. “You’ve been lying when I ask you about him, haven’t you.” He says, but it didn’t seem like a question and Seungcheol doesn’t know what else to do but nod. “Spill it, I’ve guessed there was something up with the two of you for a long time.”

“We… We’ve been sleeping together.” Seungcheol says bluntly, his heart racing in his chest. He doesn’t look at Jihoon, just blankly staring up at his apartment’s ceiling. 

“You two are sleeping together.” He repeats, and Seungcheol just nods again. “Since when?” Jihoon pushes further, and Seungcheol represses the urge to wince.

“We started it about a week after our fight, my next match after it we met again.” He explained, picking at his ripped pants, pulling the threads nervously. “Every time after I fight we sleep together.” 

Jihoon goes quiet for what feels like a long time after learning that, probably processing it and trying to break it to Seungcheol in a way that wouldn’t spook him that this wasn’t good for him. 

“It isn’t healthy, I know.” Seungcheol says, breaking the silence first, and finally looking back to Jihoon, seeing the concerned look in his features.

“If you know that, then why are you doing it still?” He asks, not understanding how Seungcheol’s brain was breaking this down just yet. “You know this isn’t going to end nicely, so why-”  
“I’m in love with him.” Seungcheol said, his voice tired and blank. He hates how that felt to say, to finally admit to himself at the same time as Jihoon, and hates how Jihoon’s eyes widen in return. “I just-... I want to enjoy it while I still have him, even if it’s just like this.” He tries to explain, knowing this wasn’t how he usually operated and how out of character this is for him. 

“Seungcheol…” Jihoon sighs, scrubbing a hand over his face and he just turns his head back to stare up at the ceiling again.

“He was with someone else tonight, Angel seemed really close to him. So it got under my skin, that’s why I fought like I did.” He explains, and that seemed to make the most sense to Jihoon because he was snapped out of his speechless state.

He could hear Jihoon take a deep breath, digesting everything as quickly as he could. “So you know what you’re going to have to do eventually right?” He asks and Seungcheol just nods, trying to keep himself calm and stable.

He doesn’t know if he’s capable of falling out of love with Angel and forgetting him.

  
  


With the truth out now to Jihoon and Mingyu, he doesn’t hide anything anymore, opening up as much as he could at one time. 

And when Seungcheol found out his next fight was against Angel, he forced himself to not care, to go numb to all of this.

But when he stepped into the ring with Angel for their second time fighting, he had to completely blank out, not letting _any_ emotions rise to the surface.

He refused to look at Angel until they were shaking hands, only then raising his eyes and seeing the man that he’s seen up close so many times now, that it almost feels like he’s come full circle. The first time he fought Angel he wanted to keep him up close, to take in how gorgeous he is, and now, the second time they’re shaking hands Seungcheol wants to be as far away from him as possible.

He barely hears the announcer call for the fight to begin before Angel is lunging at him, sending a punch to his jaw and Seungcheol’s entire mind goes blank for a solid few seconds until he can regain his footing and drag Angel forward by his shirt, bringing up a knee to his chest and effectively knocking the wind out of the blond. It doesn’t take but a few seconds for Seungcheol to trip him and throw him to the ground, immediately getting on top of him and digging his thumb into one of Angel’s pressure points, driving out the fight from him. He needs this to be over as quickly as he can manage, and if that means fighting dirty, then so be it.

If he pretends hard enough, this isn’t Angel and it’s just another guy that Seungcheol is getting paid to fight.

“Ah- I give up! Coups stop!” Angel hisses out as Seungcheol presses a bit harder, crying out in pain and the moment the announcer began to speak to announce the winner, Seungcheol rips himself away from Angel like he was just burned, leaving for the back room so that he could just change out and leave. 

The moment he got out of the main area though, his stomach starts to flip and the panic of what he just had to do starts to set in. 

He hurries to get the clean clothes out of his bag and change, shucking off his pants and pulling on the joggers he always wore home before doing the same with the shirt.

He’s too caught up in his head to register the door opening and closing, only noticing someone is in the same room as him when he feels hands on his waist turning him around. Before he could register anything familiar lips covered his, and Seungcheol almost vomits right then and there from the disgust he has for himself and the concern of why Angel still wants this after what just went down. 

“No-...” Seungcheol tries, his hands covering Angel’s and prying them off of his hips, flinching a bit when Angel laced their fingers together instead. “No- _Stop_ Angel.” He says, his voice more confident than he feels right now. He manages to get Angel off of him and his own hands back, meeting Angel’s questioning and lust blown eyes. “I can’t do this anymore.” He says quieter, almost a whisper, turning back to finish putting his shirt and pants in his bag.

“You can’t do this anymore.” Angel repeated, and Seungcheol could hear him trying to figure everything out, realizing what is happening right now. “Why?” Angel asks, still sounding distant, but more there than he’d been when he kissed Seungcheol moments ago. 

“You can either have me like this, or you can fight me. You can’t have both, and we have to fight each other down here.” Seungcheol says with a tone of finality to his voice, grabbing his bag and draping the strap over his shoulder before turning back to him one last time. “Sorry, but I can’t beat up the same person I’m sleeping with. I’ll see you around, Angel.” He says, ripping his eyes away and the man doesn’t say anything as Seungcheol leaves the room.

Jihoon and Mingyu find him minutes later in the bathroom of his apartment, puking into the toilet and looking as empty as they’ve ever seen him.

  
  
  


Seungcheol is messed up for weeks after that, randomly getting nauseous when anything reminds him of Angel or when the persistent image of Angel under him, clearly in pain that was caused by Seungcheol pops back in his head. 

He doesn’t go back to The Vault for that time, afraid that it would make him worse, and Jihoon agreed, telling him to take his time to get his mind back under his own control and that he’d let the directors of the fighting ring know he’d be out for a bit of time.

Three weeks in Jihoon, Mingyu and Wonwoo come over, insisting that they’re all eating dinner together two nights a week now, and that night Seungcheol feels good again for the first time since the fight.

It takes time, but Seungcheol slowly gets better, getting back to himself more and more until he’s back fully in his head, the entire event pushed to the farthest corner of his mind and locked up. 

  
  


It figures with his luck his first fight back in the ring would be to the guy that had broken his nose.

The universe just likes throwing meteor sized curve balls at him, after all.

Jihoon and Mingyu couldn’t make it tonight, Mingyu being out of town to visit Wonwoo’s family for the holidays, and Jihoon getting stuck with the night shift. He was here alone, and as he shakes the bigger man’s hand, he blindly wonders how he’s going to get home if he can’t fucking breathe again.

The match starts off like it had last time, both of them stepping around each other, trying to find an opening worthy enough of taking a chance on, but then there’s a kick delivered to the center of his chest, hard enough to throw him off balance and make him fall to the ground _hard_ , hard enough that his head hits the mat and he can hear that loud boom sound as his head hits the mat hard enough to jerk him and make him cry out in pain. He doesn’t have time to recover before the man is on top of Seungcheol, dodging the knee Seungcheol sent to strike his ribs. Seungcheol’s vision is hazy as he blocks the punches, it only taking one of his arms being yanked away for the man to get an angle to punch him, and when the punch lands, he slowly fades out, the fight draining out of him and black patches slowly took over all of his vision until he completely passes out.

Seungcheol wakes up with a jerk that immediately sends pain through his entire body, making him groan loudly. His ears are ringing, but it seems like it’s slowly going away as he wakes up more and more. 

He blinks a few times, bringing up a hand to his face to make sure nothing is bleeding or broken before he registers that he’s _not_ under his own blanket, and in turn that this isn’t his own room. 

He’s back in Angel’s room.

Seungcheol is just starting to question what happened when Angel walks into the room, holding a glass of water and painkillers. 

“Hey, you’re awake.” Angel says with a soft smile, handing the glass and pills over to Seungcheol who happily took and downed them. “Can you remember last night?” He asks, sitting down on the foot of the bed. Seungcheol shakes his head, trying to remember but nothing coming back to him, he knew he fought last night, he could remember leaving for The Vault, but he can’t remember anything after that. “I think you have a concussion, and your nose is broken but I set it back in place. You were in and out last night.” Angel says softly, his eyes roaming Seungcheol’s features obvious enough that he can notice. 

Seungcheol slowly sits himself up, leaning back against his hands. “Thank you, Gyu and Woozi weren’t there last night.” He says, and Angel looks like he already knew that. “Is it just bruising on my chest? Or did I end up cracking something?” He asks, feeling over the spot in the center of his chest, a pretty big place, so he must have been kicked or elbowed sometime last night. 

“Just bruising, it isn’t as bad as your ribs from before.” Angel says and Seungcheol nods idly, feeling in his pockets and finding his phone slipped into one. 

“I’ll call Woozi to pick me up, I don’t want to overstay my welcome.” He says with a soft, fond smile already dialing him up, and before Angel can say anything the line was ringing and Jihoon was picking up with a sleepy voice. 

Seungcheol explains to him what happened and asks if he’d come and pick him up rather than Seungcheol walk home, and after getting the address from Angel, Jihoon says he’ll be over in five minutes. 

“Are you two… you know..?” Angel asks causing Seungcheol’s eyebrows to raise curiously. “Are you two dating? You seem really close is all.” Angel manages to get out, the tips of his ears turning pink. 

Seungcheol shakes his head, the small smile growing into a more true, amused one. “No, we’re just good friends. I’m not dating _anyone_ right now.” He says with a soft huff of a laugh, taking another sip of the water. 

“Ah, gotcha.” Angel murmurs, smiling back to Seungcheol. “How bad is your head?” He asks, and Seungcheol shrugs a bit. 

“I’ve had a worse concussion than this, but I’ll be okay. I just need to rest and heal up.” Seungcheol says, earning a soft hum from Angel.

They spoke for the remaining minutes they had together, Seungcheol relaxing entirely too much in Angel’s presence. It was dangerously comfortable between the two of them as they fell into a natural rhythm.

After a few more minutes Seungcheol’s phone buzzed and he saw that Jihoon was waiting outside. 

“I’ll see you around, Angel.” He murmurs, stepping out of the door and into the hallway. 

Angel gave him a bright grin, leaning against the door frame. “Try to take care of yourself.” He said softly, and Seungcheol nodded, pocketing his phone and taking a few steps backwards, memorizing the visual of Angel like this before he finally turns and heads for the elevator.

“I’m going to quit fighting.” He says quietly as he carefully lays down on his bed, slipping under the covers and resting his head so it was propped up against the pillows. “I’m going to call tomorrow and tell them. I can’t keep getting my head scrambled every fight.” He says dead serious, and Jihoon looks at him like he has two heads suddenly. 

“Are you actually serious?” Jihoon asks, and Seungcheol nodded as he closes his eyes. “Oh my god you’re serious, in the years I’ve known you you’ve always liked fighting.” Jihoon breathes out, making a soft puff of a laugh escape Seungcheol.

“I just don’t want to risk it anymore, I’m studying full time now, and I can cut down next semester and pick up a real job. I have money to fall back on and the end of the term isn’t far away.” Seungcheol rambles out his reasoning, hearing Jihoon laugh quietly along with him.

“I guess if that’s what you want, do it, Cheol. They won’t like that you’re leaving, but they probably won’t try to stop you with you already being hurt.” He agrees, and that’s that.

Seungcheol goes back to sleep as soon as Jihoon leaves, letting his body take the rest it needs after the fight.

The next morning he calls the higher ups at The Vault, explaining everything about the situation, and lucky for him they understand his decision with Seungcheol’s condition in mind. He spent nearly an hour on the phone, finishing up the details and tying up the loose ends and making sure the next time they talk that everything will be finalized and Seungcheol will be free from his ties to The Vault.

When he gets off of the phone he sends off an email to his professors, informing them that he’s going to be out for around a little over a month due to an injury. 

Two weeks pass with Jihoon occasionally dropping in to check on him, and he’s slowly but surely recovering. 

If he stands up too fast his head still spins, but not nearly as badly as it had been in the beginning. He goes easy on his body, but by the beginning on the third week he can’t keep still anymore, his body so used to healing up and then fighting again, so now he has a buildup of adrenaline and energy and nowhere to use it. 

That’s how he ends up calling a 24-hour gym only a few minutes away, less distance than The Vault, and in the matter of an hour, he was a member of the gym and around midnight that night he sets out, trying to remember how he used to work out in high school as he made the walk there. 

Seungcheol burns all his energy that night in a couple hours and as he walks home in the moonlight he feels better than he has in a long time. 

He starts going twice a week at night, and quickly becomes close to the man who works the night shift, and he ends up spotting for him whenever Seungcheol bench presses.

His name is Jiwoo, and he’s not the worst looking man in the world if Seungcheol’s honest with himself. He doesn’t act on anything, though. He can see that the other man is interested in him in a way, and he doesn’t mind it as long as he doesn’t randomly try to get in Seungcheol’s pants. 

Seungcheol doesn’t want to string him along while he still is craving to have Angel back.

And damn does he miss Angel.

  
  
  


“He’s fighting tonight, if you want to go with us.” Mingyu offers and it surprises Seungcheol enough to get him to set down his food and properly look at Mingyu. 

It doesn’t have to be said who Mingyu is talking about, both of them know. 

“Who is he fighting?” He asks idly, as if he isn’t already going to go without knowing anything at all. 

“Daejung.” Mingyu says, and the world instantly froze for Seungcheol. Like full record scratch, turn black and white as a monologue plays over it. 

_Daejung was the man who had knocked Seungcheol out the two times he’d fought him._

“I’ll meet you guys there tonight.” Is all that Seungcheol says on the topic before going back to eating, trying to keep the bad thoughts from entering his mind again. 

Angel was good, just as good if not _better_ than Seungcheol. He could win this. 

  
  


Seungcheol tugs a bit on his hoodie sleeves as he entered the main room, a wave of nostalgia hitting him the moment he took in everything. Nothing has changed, and Seungcheol quickly finds Mingyu and Wonwoo off to the side that they usually sit, plopping down next to Mingyu and feeling the questioning eyes from the people who recognize him as to where he’s been and why he’s back tonight. He tries his best to ignore it.

“You’re fighting tonight too, right?” He asks, raising an eyebrow at Mingyu, and the other nodded, giving Seungcheol an excited smile. 

The small talk between them doesn’t last long until the announcer is coming on and calling the fighters to the ring, and Seungcheol caught a glimpse of blond hair. 

He doesn’t want to let Angel get in that ring, he doesn’t want to have to see him get hurt like Seungcheol had, but this wasn’t about him. Angel could do this, he had to be able to do this or Seungcheol is going to lose his mind all over again. 

The first proper look he gets at Angel he knows something is off about him. 

Something has changed in the way Angel carries himself, he’s not airy and confident anymore, now he looks like he doesn’t want to be here, completely uninterested in the fight as he gets into the ring. 

“He’s been off since you stopped showing up, he got really distanced and closed off and he spaces out a lot whenever we do see him around.” Mingyu pipes up and Seungcheol doesn’t take his eyes off of angel, watching him like a hawk, but does let out a curious noise. “I don’t know if he’s aware you quit, but most of it points to you being the reason he’s changed now.” 

“I doubt it, it isn’t like we were close on a personal level.” Seungcheol counters easily, even though Mingyu’s words echoed loudly in his mind. “We just fought and occasionally talked in passing.”

If Angel really did change right after he left, he doesn’t know how to process that or what it could even _possibly_ mean. They never had an emotional connection- _Seungcheol still doesn’t even know his name for Christ's sake-_ so it’s hard to wrap his head around the idea that he caused all of this. They were fine the morning after he’d gotten the concussion, Angel was completely normal, so what happened between then and now?  
Seungcheol is broken out of his thoughts as the announcer calls for the two fighters to ready and shake hands, and he feels nauseous when he sees Daejung give Angel a knowing grin, obviously confident in how the fight is going to turn out.

Then, the fight begins, and Seungcheol’s breath escapes him fully.

Angel fights completely different now, so aggressive and unrestrained that if you had shown a video to Seungcheol a couple months ago of this, he wouldn’t have believed you for a second. He’s still quick, faster than Daejung and that plays to his advantage as he watches the man’s head snap to the side as Angel lands the first punch of the night. 

_He doesn’t like this_ , he decides immediately. _He doesn’t like seeing Angel so out of control and angry._

The match lasts maybe five minutes tops, and Angel ends it with one last kick to the man’s torso, sending him to the ground. The audience goes wild over Angel winning, and Seungcheol can’t even begin to process what just happened. 

_Angel won_.

Angel won, and now he’s getting out of the ring and leaving with blood from his nose dripping down and falling onto his shirt.

“Does he have anyone around here that take care of him?” Seungcheol asks out of the blue to Mingyu, who’s eyebrows shoot up, thinking for a moment before shaking his head and telling Seungcheol he’s only ever seen Angel heading home alone. “I’m leaving with him then. Good luck on your match, Gyu.” He says determinedly, standing and pocketing his phone before making sure he has his keys and wallet. Mingyu thanks him and tells him to let Angel know that he can always find Mingyu or Jihoon on a night like this, and after agreeing, he sets off to the locker room. 

It takes him a minute, but he does eventually find Angel leaning over the sink, eyes closed and paper towel held to his nose.

“It feel weird, me coming to your fights and finding you bloody instead of the other way around.” Seungcheol says idly as he walks over to him, seeing Angel’s eyes blearily open and eventually find Seungcheol in the mirror. “Is your nose broken?” He asks, finally standing next to him and urging Angel to face him, gently moving his hands away to see what they were working with, because as far as he knows, Angel has never broken anything at all down here before.  
“What’re you doing here?” Angel breathes out, still trying to catch his breath, but Seungcheol can’t help but grin at how funny his voice sounds with a blocked up nose.

“Word got to me that you were fighting him, and I came _in here_ to take you home.” He explained, taking the now bloody paper towel and tossing it in the trash before getting another one and carefully folding it. “Just hold it under your nose, don’t put any pressure on it.” Seungcheol instructed, his features softening drastically as he saw just how much pain Angel is in and the tears already welling in his eyes. 

“Thank you.” Angel whispers, giving Seungcheol his best attempt at a smile. 

Seungcheol just shrugs, moving away to go find the bag he knows is Angel’s. He picks up the backpack and put it on, going back over to where Angel still was. “C’mon, let’s get you out of here.” He said says softly, wrapping his arm around Angel’s waist and Angel thankfully didn’t hesitate in letting Seungcheol take on a bit of his weight. 

They made it out of the building easy enough, going out the back way so no one would bother them. Angel was still conscious enough in the beginning of the walk for Seungcheol to slowly walk beside of him, but after a minute of it, Angel tucks himself into Seungcheol’s side, clinging to him in a way that makes it hard for them to continue on. 

It only took a few seconds before Seungcheol turned and crouched down, instructing him to climb on his back and Seungcheol would get them the rest of the way there. Thankfully, he doesn’t protest, too tired, and wraps his his arms and legs around Seungcheol, and when he stood up, Angel clung to him further. 

A few minutes later Seungcheol is unlocking his door and he’s inside with a very out of it Angel on his back, clinging to him like his life depended on it. 

“You still with me, angel?” He asks as he travels to his bedroom, and from the nod against his shoulder, Seungcheol knew he was still coherent enough to respond. “Okay, I just need to lay you down and then we’ll get you all cleaned up.” Seungcheol said, talking out loud honestly to keep both of them grounded.

Angel got off of him easy enough and doesn’t move where he’s laying on top of the blanket, watching Seungcheol move around in his room for spare clothes and then going to the bathroom to get a warm washcloth. When he comes back Angel has already taken off the paper towel and thrown it towards the trash can, and while it was probably a good attempt on Angel’s part, it only made it halfway across the room and makes Seungcheol chuckle under his breath as he picks it up and throws it away. 

“You still awake?” He asks when he sees Angel’s eyes shut, and a small smile tugs on his lips as Angel cracks open one eye just slightly, letting out a hum in conformation. “I’ve got to get the blood off of you, and then you have to get changed, okay? I’ll help if you want.” He informs him, bringing the washcloth to his face in the lightest touch he could manage, getting off all of the blood above his top lip first before washing up his chin and neck from where it had dripped down. 

Angel complies easily as Seungcheol strips him down, helping him slip on the sweat pants and tie the drawstring so they won’t fall off of Jeonghan if he gets up, and dropping the bloody shirt to the floor before slipping one of his sleep shirts over his head, careful to not get near his face. 

“All done baby, you can go to sleep if you want now.” He says softly, crouching down to gather up his clothes and take care of getting the blood out of them hopefully. It takes him a while, but soon Angel’s clothes are in the washer and Seungcheol drew in a deep breath, letting the situation finally settle in. 

He has to go check on Angel again before he settles into the couch for the night.

When he gets in the room again Angel is stirring again, and Seungcheol guesses he never fully fell asleep while Seungcheol was gone. 

“It’s all taken care of now, let’s get you under the blanket and asleep.” He says softly, gently moving him and then pulling the blanket up to his shoulders. Seungcheol is just about to take his hands away before Angel’s own are wrapping around one of his, stilling him and when he looks back, Angel is awake enough to look at him. 

“Stay with me..?” He says in such a fragile, stuffy voice that Seungcheol’s heart feels like it’s going to break through his chest from how fast it’s beating. 

Seungcheol takes a deep breath before nodding a bit, lifting the blanket and watching Angel happily scoot over to his side of the bed and make room for Seungcheol to climb in. 

Once he gets settled Angel is draping himself across Seungcheol like he used to, at least being careful as he tucks his face into Seungcheol’s neck. 

Angel falls asleep quickly with Seungcheol here now, and Seungcheol forces himself to think that this doesn’t mean anything.

Seungcheol wakes up to something moving on top of him, and he groans groggily, not registering what was happening. He’s still foggy, but when the moving and shifting of weight doesn’t stop he finally does come to the surface, waking up enough to blink open his eyes and figure out if anything bad was happening.

Angel is fully awake, and looking at him like he can’t believe Seungcheol is actually in the same bed as him. 

After a few seconds and a few blinks later, Seungcheol just huffs and wraps his arms firmer around Angel, his eyes falling back closed. 

“Go back to sleep, it’s barely light outside.” He murmurs in a crackly, sleepy low toned voice, and he can already feel himself drifting back off.

He falls asleep to the sound of Angel huffing out a laugh and resting back against him.

  
  


The next time he wakes up to a hand shaking his shoulder lightly, and a voice murmuring something. 

Seungcheol frowns a bit, trying to wake himself up and focus enough to open his eyes. Once he does, Seungcheol realizes Angel is awake again.

“-ringing. Wake up.” Angel says, and Seungcheol’s eyebrows drew together in confusion. “Your phone is ringing, Coups.” He repeats, and that woke him up enough for him to regain his motor functions. 

“Seungcheol.” He blurts out, and Angel’s eyes widened in surprise and confusion. “My name is Seungcheol.” He retries, sitting up and looking away from Angel, cursing himself inwardly at just dropping that on Angel in his morning haze. 

He got up before Angel can say anything, grabbing his phone off of the nightstand and answering the call when he saw it was Jihoon.

“Hello..?” He murmurs, sitting down on the bed and hearing movement on the other side of the phone. 

“ _You’re finally up, huh?”_ Jihoon says, and that brought a small smile to his lips.

“I am, did you call just to wake me up?” Seungcheol asks playfully, relaxing a bit more.

“ _You have Angel in your apartment, right?_ ” Jihoon asks, not beating around the bush at all. 

“Uh, yeah..?” He asks more than says, and he feels the bed shift a bit.

“ _Tell him congrats, everyone is talking about his fight. Take care of him, Cheol.”_ Jihoon says, and Seungcheol hums in agreement. _“I just wanted to call and make sure the two of you are okay.”_

“We are, he has a broken nose but it should be fine.” He says, glancing back to Angel and seeing that he was laid back down again. The two of them went back and forth a few more times, catching up briefly before the line goes dead and Seungcheol sets his phone back on the nightstand. 

“Jihoon says congrats for winning last night.” He says, turning back to Angel on the bed, who stared up at him curiously. “Jihoon is Woozi, the shorter guy I hang around. The taller one’s name is Mingyu.” He explains, falling back on the bed lazily and stretching out. 

“Ah, gotcha.” Angel murmurs with a soft smile, and Seungcheol for a moment thinks he’s still asleep and dreaming. Angel looks beautiful, more than beautiful, stretched out on top of his blanket, fully clothed and just taking in the sunlight from the window. He wants to wake up to this every day, but as far as he knows, Angel has a boyfriend still. “Seungcheol fits you, but I don’t know why you’re telling me all of this.” Angel says honestly, and it makes Seungcheol pause for a long moment.

“Mingyu told me you don’t hang around anyone at The Vault, so if you need someone in a pinch, you can ask for one of them and they’ll help you out.” He explains quietly, rolling onto his side and tucking his arm under the pillow. 

“Why not you?” Angel asks, and Seungcheol realizes Angel still might not know he’s quit.

“I left for good after my concussion.” He says hesitantly, and that seems to shock Angel. “You can still ask those two to get me, or you can have my number. If you’d rather it be me than I’ll be there.” Seungcheol says truthfully, still lost in the process of taking in Angel right now.

“But you were really good, you’re just giving it up?” He asks, and Seungcheol just shrugs indifferently, sitting back up groggily before standing and stretching his body out. 

“C’mon, I’ll make you breakfast and we can check on your nose after.” He says, and Angel almost looks like he wants to say something else, but decides against it, so Seungcheol quickly dismisses the idea.

They end up heating half of a pizza in the microwave that Seungcheol had gotten with Mingyu the day before rather than actually cooking.

“So you’re in college.” Angel comments, taking a bite of pizza and watching Seungcheol closely for some reason that Seungcheol doesn’t know of.

“I am. You’ve seen my books lying around I’m guessing.” He replies after he’s taken a bite out of the pizza and set it back down. 

Angel nods and after a moment he’s speaking again. “I go to the same college, I just take night classes so I probably wouldn’t have seen you around.” He admits, and that takes Seungcheol aback for a moment before he’s nodding in understanding on taking classes at night since that’s what he used to do when he started fighting and the bruising was worse after every fight.

They go back and forth idly as they eat, the playful banter that they had the morning Seungcheol spent at Angel’s apartment coming back naturally. It isn’t long until they get into more personal things like Seungcheol’s younger brother Dino not knowing Seungcheol fought, and how Jeonghan dropped fighting in a professional space and ended up coming to The Vault.

“So, are you seeing anyone? For a while there I thought you were with Jihoon.” Angel asks, and Seungcheol returned his eyes to the blonde from where he was getting a second piece of pizza.

“No, I haven’t seen anyone since I stopped seeing you.” Seungcheol says honestly, and Jeonghan just about chokes in surprise to how blunt Seungcheol actually is. 

It takes him a few moments to recover, but after that he’s coming back with another follow up question. “Why did you stop it? I never understood that.”

Seungcheol looks over his face, lingering on his red nose and the lingering thought that he needs to get Angel to put ice on it after this pops into his head as he tries to form a coherent response. “I told you you couldn’t have me both ways, and with both of us fighting then, I had to stop it.” He begins, watching Angel closely for any tells on how he’s thinking. When he finds nothing negative hidden in his features of eyes, he continues on. “I was fucked up for months after I had to fight you, Angel-”

_“Jeonghan.”_

Seungcheol blinks, briefly surprised at being cut off and almost not catching what Angel had said.

“Jeonghan.” He repeats, and Angel- _no, his name was Jeonghan,_ nods as he takes another bite of pizza, urging Seungcheol non-verbally to continue. “I got too involved with getting to know you that it clouded over the part of my brain that knew how to win a fight. That’s why I put you on the ground as quickly as I could that night, I didn’t want to fight you.”  
“You looked sick when you left.” Jeonghan comments, and Seungcheol just shrugs a bit. 

“I was nauseous the moment I saw you in pain that I knew I had caused, and I just… got disgusted with myself that when you kissed me right after what I had done and was already panicking over I shut down.” He explains the best way he can manage, finishing off the piece of pizza and lifting the can of soda to his lips, washing it down easily before speaking again. “It was all a blur the rest of the night, but Mingyu and Jihoon say they found me puking into the toilet here a few minutes after I left the place.” 

“I don’t blame you for hurting me during that fight, you know that right? If it wasn’t you doing it then it would have been me, and I for one don’t know pressure points so it would have taken longer.” Jeonghan comments, not concerned at all about the way Seungcheol has fought him. “Would you have kept seeing me if we didn’t have to fight?” He asks, and from what Seungcheol can tell he’s genuinely curious and wants to know the truth behind it.

“Of course I would have.” Seungcheol says with a soft chuckle, running a hand through his hair and picking up his drink again to distract himself. “I would have asked you out a long time ago on a date if I didn’t have the reminder of fighting constantly in my head.” He admits, figuring why the hell not come clean fully now that both of them are opening up to the topic they never spoke about.

“Last night was my last fight.” Jeonghan rushes out like it’s his dying breath, and Seungcheol looks back to him, a bit alarmed at the sudden change in the blonde’s tone. “I put in that I was leaving The Vault last month and they asked me to stay until this fight. I don’t fight for them anymore.”

Seungcheol is quiet for a long moment, just staring at Jeonghan with his brain connecting dots and drawing out an entire fucking spreadsheet at this point.

Finally, he raises the can back up, taking his time drinking another swig of it before setting it back down again and giving Jeonghan all of his attention. 

“Well, what are you doing tonight, Jeonghan?”

It turns out that Jeonghan never thought Seungcheol wanted him like that, but it wasn’t unrequited in the least. He quickly agreed to go out tonight with Seungcheol after Seungcheol confirmed it as a date date, not just getting dinner and coming back to fuck.

“You better get out of here, you’ll get sick of me before I can even shoot my shot tonight.” Seungcheol teases, handing over Jeonghan’s now clean and tried clothes before leaning on the doorway, gazing openly at Jeonghan for the first time since they met.

“Like you have anything to do today, Cheol.” Jeonghan snorts, but does take the clothes, still wearing Seungcheol’s to leave, and the owner of them can’t find it in himself to mind sending him home with them. He looks better in them that Seungcheol does, after all.

Then he’s moving closer, leaning in for a kiss goodbye and Seungcheol is reeling back with a choked noise at how bold Jeonghan actually is. 

“Yah! I don’t kiss before the first date, you womanizer.” He complains loudly, in the back of his mind hoping that his neighbors are out today. 

Jeonghan gives him a _look_ like ‘I can’t believe you’re pulling that right now’ before coming closer and closer until Seungcheol can’t squirm out of it, crowding him against the actual door and letting out a bright laugh that matches Seungcheol’s own. Jeonghan kisses him just like Seungcheol remembers, taking his time and drawing out every movement. It doesn’t last long, maybe a few seconds before he pulls away with a knowing grin, winking at Seungcheol who’s ears are now red. 

“I’ll see you tonight, meet you here, right?” He asks just to make sure he’s got it right, and Seungcheol nods, a dopey grin pulling his lips up. 

Seungcheol watches him go, now knowing what he looks like in the mornings, how it feels to wake up with him still there, and that his name is Yoon Jeonghan.

  
  
  


The first date goes better than Seungcheol could have ever hoped for, both of them clicking instantly. Jeonghan is hilarious in a way different that Mingyu or Jihoon, he’s more sly and half the time it catches Seungcheol off guard. 

Their second date goes just as well, both of them just heading downtown to walk through the shops. He quickly finds out that Jeonghan has never been out here at nighttime, seeing all the fairy lights and lanterns hung up. Jeonghan gushes over them the entire time they’re there, wanting to see everything he could and dragging Seungcheol all over the area.

When they finally head home they’re both tripping over each other out of the elevator and laughing hard at something Jeonghan says, the blonde leaning most of his weight on Seungcheol as he ushers him towards his apartment. 

“Go inside you punk.” Seungcheol fusses once Jeonghan unlocks his apartment door but doesn’t make any move to head inside. “I don’t think your neighbors would appreciate being woken up tonight.” 

He finally wrangles Jeonghan inside, loud giggles filling the apartment from both of them as they took off their shoes and jackets, stripping down to their underwear and climbing into Jeonghan’s bed. 

“Have I told you just how gorgeous you are.” Seungcheol murmurs, a dopey smile pulling at his lips as Jeonghan covered them both with the blanket and then laid down beside him. 

“Nope, I don’t think you have.” Jeonghan replies with a soft, shy smile. 

Seungcheol hums in return, looking at Jeonghan and just looking at him in the low light since they didn’t turn on the bedroom light. “You’re genuinely the best person I’ve met in a long time. You’re perfect for me, we match, you know?” He starts, already seeing heat rise up to Jeonghan’s cheeks. “Your laugh is so cute, I love it when you get so caught up in a joke and you toss your head back and lean onto me. When you completely let your guard down and go completely soft, letting me inside your head and helping me understand how you think.” He praises, leaning in for a kiss after he spoke. There wasn’t any urgency in the kiss, Seungcheol just enjoying the fact that he was allowed to do this now before he pulled away only to be dragged back into another kiss by a protesting Jeonghan. He laughs into he kiss but doesn’t pull away again, letting Jeonghan take and take and take until he is satisfied and finally breaks the kiss himself. 

“You’re too good at this, it shouldn’t be allowed.” Jeonghan says with a soft chuckle, his lips still just inches away from Seungcheol’s, not having pulled away far at all. 

“It’s because I was already in love with you before now, Hannie. I have an advantage.” He says carelessly and Jeonghan shoves his shoulder, hard enough to roll Seungcheol back on his back and draw a loud laugh from him. 

“You can’t just _say that_ , I wanted to tell you the I love you first.” Jeonghan complains, but there isn’t anything in his voice to back it up, just affection still there. He drapes himself dramatically over Seungcheol, still whining about this and that just to make a point that both of them know isn’t anything to care about while Seungcheol just tries to reassure him that he can take it back and they can pretend that Jeonghan says it first. 

This feels more like home than Seungcheol could have ever expected.

  
  
  


Their daily routine start to adjust and incorporate each other as days go on, both of them still trying to adjust to the relationship aspect of this and that they’re not just sleeping together.

On the days that Jeonghan has night classes Seungcheol walks with him and just stays in the campus library, getting his own work done until Jeonghan is ready to leave. On the days Seungcheol has morning classes Jeonghan will sometimes appear out of nowhere after class with two cups of coffee, waiting for him to see him even though Jeonghan is _not_ a morning person and his coffee is usually already half gone when Seungcheol gets to him. If Seungcheol pretends that he can’t drink a lot of coffee in one sitting and gives Jeonghan the last quarter of his drink every time, no one has to know.

They quickly do settle into the fact that everyone does know they’re together so they have nothing to hide. 

Jeonghan will most always lace their fingers together when walking side by side, swinging their arms between them and anytime Seungcheol comments on it, Jeonghan will just dramatically swing them higher, sending Seungcheol into a fit of laughter every time. 

When they go out for drinks with their friends, Seungcheol is mostly glued to Jeonghan’s side, not liking for the blonde to be out of his reach just because on these nights he usually hasn’t seen Jeonghan in a few days. He doesn’t get jealous or possessive, he tries his hardest to never think like that because Jeonghan is his own person, he’s not owned by Seungcheol, he doesn’t have to tell Seungcheol about everything he’s going to do. What he does do though, is let Jeonghan sit in his lap whenever they sit down for drinks, Seungcheol becoming his choice of a chair more often than not. Seungcheol will wrap him up in his arms, pressing a few kisses to his shoulders or hair as small reminders of _‘I love you’_ , since neither of them outwardly say it regularly. 

Jeonghan shows it through squeezing his hand and grinning brightly at him, or tapping anywhere on his body a few times, just a quick drum of his fingers. Seungcheol shows it this way, through small kisses and through lingering stares while he’s admiring his boyfriend. 

Jeonghan has a habit of kissing Seungcheol somewhere, anywhere from his hand to his shoulder to his cheek or lips when he spaces out, which he has a habit of doing when left to his own devices. Jeonghan always brings him back with just a touch of soft lips to Seungcheol’s skin and that snaps him back instantly. 

He learns that Jeonghan doesn’t like to over eat in the slightest in the beginning. He won’t tell Seungcheol why and Seungcheol doesn’t ask again after the second time of it happening. What he does do is respect that boundary, but quickly begins breaking down those walls little by little by learning all of Jeonghan’s favorite foods or sweets and cooking them for him when they are alone. Little by little, Jeonghan gets better and now, four months into being together, Jeonghan sometimes eats more than he even does without feeling bad, and every time Seungcheol is there to witness it a feeling of love and adoration shoots through him.

It takes Jeonghan a while to catch onto the fact that Seungcheol is still working out, but once he does he squawks and pesters Seungcheol until he gives up all of the details of where and when he goes because Jeonghan wants to go too. He misses exercising and the calm that fighting gave him. 

“C’mon, I’ll introduce you to the guy who usually spots for me, he works the night shift here.” Seungcheol says as they approach the building walking side by side with Seungcheol’s arm around Jeonghan’s middle, and Jeonghan’s hand in his back pocket of his jeans.

“What? I want to spot for you.” Jeonghan says in a slight pout, and it makes Seungcheol laugh.

“You _are_ going to be my spotter from now on, stop worrying.” Seungcheol says, swinging their arms again from when Jeonghan had stopped at the small news. 

Jeonghan does _not_ like Jiwoo at first, but after a few minutes of everyone talking, he warms up to him enough to let go of Seungcheol’s hand. 

“He has a crush on you, you know.” Jeonghan says after they drop their bags off in the locker room and head over to the weight bench. 

Seungcheol looks back to Jeonghan, seeing a slight glimmer of insecurity hidden away in his eyes. “I know. I could have tried things out with him, but I waited for you.” Seungcheol commented, checking the weights that were already on the bar and changing them around before sitting down on the bench. “He’s never made any move towards me, and now he certainly won’t because he knows I’ve been dating someone.” 

Jeonghan seems to relax at that, huffing out a breath. “So you want me to spot you?” He asks, changing the subject and beginning to head around to the back of the bench where you would traditionally stand to spot someone.

Seungcheol catches his wrist though and gives a disagreeing noise not letting Jeonghan go until he comes closer. He lays down on the bench, giving Jeonghan a knowing smile. “You see how my legs are on either side of the bench, you need to do the same thing to stand over me and spot me.” 

Jeonghan’s features immediately sharpen and he narrows his eyes at Seungcheol. “Don’t tell me that he-”

“He stood behind me, not like how you’re going to be.” Seungcheol reassures before wiggling around and getting comfortable. “Now c’mon, you get to stand over my waist and help me out.” Seungcheol complains playfully, watching as Jeonghan breaks out of that mood in the next few seconds. “You just have to hold the bar loosely.” 

“What do I get out of it?” Jeonghan comments even though he does as Seungcheol instructed and swings his leg over to stand over Seungcheol.

“You get to sit back on my legs to keep me still for the next part. Fifteen reps spaced by five sit ups, each sit up you get a kiss if you want one.” Seungcheol bargains, and that seems to satisfy Jeonghan enough for him to easily go along with it. “Ready?” Seungcheol asks, wiping his hands on his shirt before wrapping them around the bar, when Jeonghan nodded and held the bar in between his hands he took the bar off the stable slot, beginning the set. 

He knocks them out relatively easily, raising the bar back to rest on the stand before instructing Jeonghan to sit down on his thighs. 

The first sit up was fine, both of them getting used to how weight was distributed, but the second Jeonghan catches his shirt collar and pulls him in for a quick kiss, grinning cheekily. 

And that’s how Seungcheol knows tempting Jeonghan with this might have been a bad move. 

Fifteen minutes and three sets later, Seungcheol comes back up for the last sit up and lets Jeonghan pull him into another kiss. 

“You’re going to be the death of me.” He mumbles, still out of breath once they part and Seungcheol lays back down, exhausted. 

Jeonghan just grins down at him, and he can’t find it in himself to even pretend like he’s annoyed.

He loves Jeonghan, even if the blond told him quickly after Seungcheol finished that he didn’t actually come here to work out, he just wanted to see Seungcheol like this, earning a smack to the thigh from Seungcheol in retaliation.

Seungcheol wakes up the next morning sore from the night before, but with a sleeping Jeonghan curled up against him and clinging to him even in his sleep.

He knows what Jeonghan looks in the mornings, under fairy lights at night, crying over a drama on TV, and stumbling into the kitchen when he wakes up to the smell of Seungcheol cooking. He knows how to get Jeonghan awake and not grumpy in the mornings as they brush their teeth side by side, he knows Jeonghan doesn’t like salt in his popcorn, he knows Jeonghan’s favorite flavor is strawberries.

And he knows he’s for a fact in love with a man named Yoon Jeonghan who loves him back just as much, a man Seungcheol would fight the world for.

A man Seungcheol can and will fight the world for.

**Author's Note:**

> this was rlly an impulse write, so i hope it actually flows well lol  
> this wasn't beta read, all mistakes are mine, so if you find anything just lmk!
> 
> you can find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/softtsett), and if you have any sugestions on what to write next going past this, or any comments you don't want to leave here, I have a [cc](https://curiouscat.me/softency) :)


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